NONFICTION - June 9, 1996

BEACHCOMBING AT MIRAMAR: The Quest for an Authentic Life by Richard Bode (Warner Books: $15.95; 196 pp.). Since, it often seems, the lives of 95% of the adult population in the universe are in a state of perpetual transition, tales told by other adults about how they stopped the merry-go-round to figure out the next step will never want for an audience.

Richard Bode--a freelance journalist, speech writer and former public relations mover-and-shaker type--waited a long time for his transition: Thirty years of unhappy marriage (Lord have mercy), four children and a career that, by all accounts, never felt quite right. He refers to beachcombing several times as his true profession and he spends the period covered in this restful book refining his ideas about the companions we choose and the pace at which we live our lives.